One in eight workers in West Midlands in insecure work
One in eight workers in the West Midlands is in insecure work, analysis by the Trades Union Congress had found.
Insecure work is characterised by low pay, variable hours and fewer rights and protections for workers.
The disproportionate concentration of black and minority ethnic workers in insecure work shows “structural racism in action”, the TUC claims.
The TUC says that 351,300 workers in the West Midlands are in insecure work – that equates to 12.5 per cent of the regional workforce.
It claims that the UK is becoming a nation of insecure jobs, with precarious and low-paid work widespread in all regions and nations
Nationally there are 3.9 million people in insecure employment – one in nine across the workforce.
Industries with the highest proportion of insecure work are the elementary occupations, caring, and leisure services, and process, plant and machine operatives.
Low-paid work is increasingly insecure work – in 2011, one in eight low-paid jobs were insecure, but by the end of 2022, it was one in five,
TUC Midlands regional secretary Lee Barron said: “Everyone deserves to be treated with dignity and respect at work.
“But too many workers in the West Midlands are trapped in low-paid, insecure jobs with limited rights and protections, and treated like disposable labour.
“It’s time to end the scourge of insecure work once and for all.
“That means banning exploitative zero hours contracts.
“It means delivering fair pay agreements to lift pay and standards across whole industries.
“And it means tackling the discrimination that holds BME workers back – including by placing a duty on employers to report their ethnicity pay gap and take action to close it.”
